Original Proposal

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johnkarls
Posts: 2034
Joined: Fri Jun 29, 2007 8:43 pm

Original Proposal

Post by johnkarls »

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From: ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com
To: ReadingLiberallyEmailList@johnkarls.com
Bcc: The Approximately 150 Recipients of Our Weekly E-mail
Subject: American Amnesia: How The War On American Government Led Us To Forget What Made America Prosper – For Aug 9
Date: Sat, July 15, 2017
Attachments:
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Dear Friends,

Our next meeting is Wednesday evening, August 9th, at the Salt Lake Public Library (210 East 400 South).


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OUR FOCUS BOOK FOR AUG 9

American Amnesia: How The War On American Government Led Us To Forget What Made America Prosper by Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson [Simon & Shuster – Hardback Publisher – 3/29/2016 – 369 pages sans footnotes & index) was proposed by one of our regulars, Ted Gurney, a retired U/U Biology Professor.

Amazon.com -- $9.35 paperback + shipping or $12.99 e-book.
Other bookstores listed on Amazon.com -- from $5.36 used or $8.77 new + shipping.
Salt Lake Public Library – 1 of 2 copies currently available.
Salt Lake County Library -- 2 of 3 copies currently available.


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AUTHOR BIOS

Jacob S. Hacker is the Stanley B. Resor Professor of Political Science at Yale University. A Fellow at the New America Foundation in Washington, DC, he is the author of The Great Risk Shift: The New Economic Insecurity and the Decline of the American Dream, The Divided Welfare State, and, with Paul Pierson, of American Amnesia: The Forgotten Roots of Our Prosperity; Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class; Off Center: The Republican Revolution and the Erosion of American Democracy. He has appeared recently on The NewsHour, MSNBC, All Things Considered, and Marketplace.

Paul Pierson is the John Gross Professor of Political Science at the University of California at Berkeley. He is the author of Politics in Time, Dismantling the Welfare State?, and (with Jacob S. Hacker), American Amnesia: The Forgotten Roots of Our Prosperity; Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class; Off Center: The Republican Revolution and the Erosion of American Democracy. His commentary has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post, and The New York Review of Books.

Their “Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer -- and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class” was the focus of our 8/8/2012 meeting 5 years ago.


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AMAZON DESCRIPTION (which usually quotes the book cover fly leaf)

A “provocative” (Kirkus Reviews), timely, and topical work that examines what’s good for American business and what’s good for Americans—and why those interests are misaligned.

In American Amnesia, bestselling political scientists Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson trace the economic and political history of the United States over the last century and show how a viable mixed economy has long been the dominant engine of America’s prosperity. We have largely forgotten this reliance, as many political circles and corporate actors have come to mistakenly see government as a hindrance rather than the propeller it once was. “American Amnesia” is more than a rhetorical phrase; elites have literally forgotten, or at least forgotten to talk about, the essential role of public authority in achieving big positive-sum bargains in advanced societies.

The mixed economy was the most important social innovation of the twentieth century. It spread a previously unimaginable level of broad prosperity. It enabled steep increases in education, health, longevity, and economic security. And yet, extraordinarily, it is anathema to many current economic and political elites. Looking at this record of remarkable accomplishment, they recoil in horror. And as the advocates of anti-government free market fundamentalist have gained power, they are hell-bent on scrapping the instrument of nearly a century of unprecedented economic and social progress. In the American Amnesia, Hacker and Pierson explain the full “story of how government helped make America great, how the enthusiasm for bashing government is behind its current malaise, and how a return to effective government is the answer the nation is looking for” (The New York Times).


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RSVP’S REQUESTED BY NEXT FRIDAY

In accordance with our quorum-revision policy of 6/12/2013, instead of waiting until the last week before each monthly meeting to request RSVP’s and canceling if we do not have our minimum quorum of six, RSVP’s are requested in our first-of-the-monthly-cycle weekly e-mail.

Those who have RSVP’d will be informed immediately when we reach six so that they can proceed to read the materials with assurance that a discussion will take place.

If there are not six RSVP’s by 11:59 pm next Friday, then next week’s weekly e-mail will announce that the 8/9/2017 meeting is cancelled.


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SKYPE PARTICIPATION

Non-SLCounty residents (and residents who are out of town) are invited to participate in our meeting via Skype.

If you would like to do so, please press your reply button and type “request participation via Skype” and we will contact you to make appropriate arrangements.


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We hope to see all of you on August 9th.

Your friend,

John K.

PS -- To un-subscribe, please press "reply" and type "deletion requested."

NB: Please do NOT block our e-mail because you are too embarrassed to request a deletion -- 10 of our approximately 150 regular e-mail recipients use Comcast.net which has an algorithm blocking all e-mails from a website for which a certain percentage of recipients have requested blockage AND 3 of our regular meeting attendees who use Comcast.net now can NOT receive our weekly e-mails.

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